Masaka, Uganda | By Michael Wandati | Leaders of the National Unity Platform (NUP) in Masaka have strongly criticized the senior leadership of their party for demanding the resignation of MP Mathias Mpuuga Nsamba from his position as Parliamentary Commissioner.
On Thursday evening, the NUP secretariat issued a statement calling for Mpuuga’s immediate resignation, alleging his involvement in corruption and abuse of office. The party accused him of accepting a Service Award of 500 million Shillings from the Parliamentary Commission.
The statement revealed that, in response to public outcry, Party President Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu convened a meeting of senior party leaders. The leaders unanimously indicted Mpuuga for corruption and abuse of office, citing violations of the party’s core values such as discipline, reliability, inclusiveness, integrity, patriotism, and service.
In a counter-response, NUP leaders in Masaka are demanding a public apology and the immediate withdrawal of the statement, deeming it absurd and unreasonable.
Charles Mary Mbanga, Chairperson of Masaka NUP Elders Council, read a statement accusing the Party President of acting on misinformation propagated by a group of individuals with ulterior motives.
According to Mbanga, the 500 million Shillings service award was Mpuuga’s honorary gratuity, officially determined by the Parliamentary Commission. He questioned why the party misconstrued it as an act of corruption.
Mbanga further accused the NUP Party President of tolerating indiscipline within certain party factions, which are now resorting to blackmail and undermining anyone attempting to instill order.
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The leaders asserted that the Party President has surrounded himself with a select few, including some family members, who specialize in diminishing and undermining leaders perceived as potential successors to Kyagulagunyi.
Meanwhile, Mpuuga dismissed the accusations and calls for his resignation as malicious and speculative. He characterized the ongoing debate as a deliberate and well-orchestrated campaign to tarnish his character.
“I am ready for the worst if it takes this sacrifice to return sanity and common sense to our politics. I am available as ever to help this young party rid of any form of corruption from its rank and file and especially that ingrained at the base of the party. I accordingly decline the cowardly call on me to resign as a Parliamentary Commissioner, based on spite, envy and deliberate misrepresentation,” he indicates.
However, while speaking at a meeting of NUP leaders from Wakiso district on Friday 1, March 2024 at the Party Headquarters in Makerere-Kavule, Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu insisted that Mpuuga owes the party and the public an apology for the abuse of taxpayers’ money.
